Monday 13 May 2013 12.20 EDT
First published on Monday 13 May 2013 12.20 EDT

First, the sales pitch. Wayne Rooney, one of the most instantly recognisable strikers in world football, is on the market, seeking a fresh start at a club who will make him feel integral once again. Manchester United and the player may decide not to part company after nine years at Old Trafford but, privately, the club are pragmatic enough to realise any weighty offer for a player who is clearly unsettled and enters the final two years of his deal this summer would have to be considered.

Rewind three years and Rooney had scored 26 goals in 32 Premier League games, claimed the Professional Footballers' Association player of the year award and was being mentioned in the same breath as Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. He is still only 27 and has 22 goals for club and country this season, his tally swollen to 198 in 401 appearances for Manchester United.

Just for good measure, he may well end up captaining England at the Maracanã on 2 June.

Players of his calibre do not agitate for a fresh challenge too often, which should either galvanise elite clubs across Europe, both those with established wealth and the batch of nouveaux riches, to enter an auction, or perhaps even motivate United into kick-starting contract negotiations and extend his stay beyond 2015. Either way, the player and his camp should benefit.

But then comes the reality check, the acknowledgement that there simply are not that many glamorous clubs out there who would either be inclined or able to take the player on. Rooney, on at least £250,000 a week and presumably unwilling to accept a wage cut, is competing for a move not to a pool but a puddle of clubs.

The Premier League offers up Manchester City, who are reluctant to revive the interest that flared two-and-a-half years ago, and Chelsea. The London club are soon to be under new management themselves and have been keen in the past, but their admiration is understood to have long since waned: he would be a No10 in a line-up already boasting Juan Mata, Eden Hazard and Oscar, and, while few query his industry, doubts persist these days as to whether he still has the fluid movement to lead the line on his own.

Of the overseas options – and these are only mooted on the assumption he and his young family would be happy to move abroad – Bayern Munich may now be operating in a different sphere. Mario Götze is theirs and, potentially, Robert Lewandowski will follow from Borussia Dortmund, players who are coming into their own on this stage.

Presumably life with the money-flushed globetrotters of Anzhi Makhachkala in Russia, meanwhile, would be far from appealing.

The French league offers promise, either with the newly crowned champions Paris Saint-Germain or recently promoted Monaco, but both clubs are effectively in flux. Carlo Ancelotti is expected to leave Parc des Princes and doubts also surround the job of the sporting director Leonardo, who was hospitalised on Monday after collapsing, while the government's proposed 75% income tax rate might prove dissuasive. The French football authorities still hope to impose those same rules on Monaco, a disruptive dispute that will rumble on into the summer in the principality.

It says much about the player Rooney was – or, at least, the potential he has always threatened – that a season that has yielded a relatively impressive haul of goals actually feels utterly underwhelming. The striker's star has slipped at Old Trafford, eclipsed by that of Robin van Persie, with the Englishman left to flit between positions, from central midfield to auxiliary forward to wide man, as he gropes to make an impact.

The flashes of brilliance have been sporadic and that familiar scowl has returned in recent months. He wore the same haggard look during England's spluttering World Cup campaign in 2010, when his mood was sour. Any suitor would scrutinise recent displays and wonder what happened to the rough diamond of a player, so brimming with enthusiasm, who exploded on to the scene a decade ago and has enjoyed productive campaigns, certainly at club level, in many of the years since.

Sir Alex Ferguson has appeared to spend much of this season questioning the way Rooney leads his life, the tone set by his inclusion for a meaningless Champions League group game against Cluj in early December just a few days before a significant collision at the Etihad Stadium. "Wayne needs to be playing a lot of games to get his match fitness," the manager said at the time. "He is a strongly built lad and, when he misses two games, it takes him three games to come back." Rooney trained as usual at Carrington in the build-up to Sunday's visit by Swansea, a game that culminated in the trophy presentation, and is fit, but, physically, he can appear to be beyond his mid-20s.

The same cannot be said for his outlook. The tantrums have become a feature of his relationship at Old Trafford, even if previous talk of a move – back in 2010 – eventually yielded the lucrative five-year contract to which he is currently tied. The booing of his name post-match on Sunday reflected the fans' weariness at such stroppiness. Other clubs may wonder if a player who seems to throw his toys from the pram whenever life is conspiring against him, on or off the pitch, is a sensible investment.

All of which rather reinforces the point made by Gary Neville, while working as a pundit on the pitch at Old Trafford, that the striker is "27 and there's nowhere to go". The former team-mate turned England coach urged Rooney to take some time to contemplate his next move. It may be time for him to accept life with United is, actually, as good as it gets.